California

"Opening a new front in its broad legal battle against policies of President Trump, California filed a lawsuit Wednesday alleging that the administration has overstepped its powers in expediting construction of a wall at the U.S.-Mexico border."

"California sued the federal government Monday over the Trump administration’s decision to postpone indefinitely a decision by former President Barack Obama to dramatically increase the penalties for violating federal fuel economy standards."

"There was no shortage of red flags at Oroville Dam. It was a matter of knowing where to look."

The renaming of facilities at Yosemite National Park, because of a contract-related trademark dispute, "is an opportunity for the National Park Service to dump dozens of place names that are the linguistic equivalents of Confederate statues."

"Fire officials said on Monday they had effectively stopped the uncontrolled spread of the largest wildfire in Los Angeles history, with a little help from cooler weather, but were still working to contain it."

"Decades after declaring 1,2,3-TCP a carcinogen, California is finally regulating the toxin. But the cost of remediation will be high and communities are turning toward litigation to pay for water treatment."

"In a sweeping legal fight that could affect drinking water supplies for thousands of Sacramento-area residents, two water districts near the old McClellan Air Force Base are suing the federal government for $1.4 billion to clean up the cancer-causing chemical hexavalent chromium from the area’s groundwater supplies."

"Los Angeles is woefully park poor. Less than half of L.A. County residents have easy access to a park, and three-quarters of the public spaces we do have are falling apart."

"Just beyond the southeast corner of Joshua Tree National Park, rows of boarded-up houses, gouged mountainsides and concrete ruins are an ugly reminder of the never-ending battle over the West’s public lands."

"One warm spring day a year ago, Griselda Barrera, a Mexican-born mother of three, went to a middle school auditorium in Thermal, California, an unincorporated community in the desert east of Los Angeles, to square off against a panel of regulators. Barrera, who is just 5 feet tall, wore a black pencil skirt and platform pumps, the kind of shoes she favors now that she no longer works in the fields. She was flanked by mothers like herself, there to give public comment to the South Coast Air Quality Management District."